Misunderstanding Or Deviation:a Study On The Identity Of Chinese Middle Class

Along with the rapidly economic growth and urbanization, the social structure in china becomes divided deeply, in the period of more than three decades after the reform and opening policies. A group called Middle Class is expanding gradually. And the identity study is one of the most important views to study the social stratification. The attention and interest on the identity of the middle class makes my study up. Based on the survey in Nanjing, Suzhou and Lianyungang, the study discussed three questions about the stratum identity, status identity and stratum identity deviation.Our study finds that, the group of the middle class is already affected by the differentiation of the social stratification structure and the growth of the amount of the people in the middle of the social structure.As the imagination of the amount, they are better educated, have a decent occupation, and a good salary above the average. The group mainly contains civil servants, white collars in business, some middle or small company owners, and the employees with Professional technology. They almost have the college degree, and can get more than one billion per year.Secondly, the interviewees who are belonged to the middle class cannot understand the meaning of "middle class" well. They get the meaning indistinctly and unilaterally. Their status identity shows up there inclinations:positive identity, negative identity, fuzz identity, and the ones of negative identity are in the majority. According to the culture theory of class formation, the situation is because of the misunderstanding of the "middle class", which is constructed by the consumerism, different and complex class experiences, and lack of common values. The formation of middle class status identity, first of all, depends on the common position in the social structure, and the conscious of middle social stratum identity, but also need to form common properties of consumption, culture value, in its class interaction and experience.Thirdly, the interviewees have obvious middle-consciousness. Almost think that, their socioeconomic statuses are in the middle of the social structure. After comparing the subject status with the object identity status, we find that, their identification appears three tendencies, namely consistent identifying, upper deviation, lower deviation. According to the Social Identity theory, people who compare themselves with the middle group in the imagination, may properly identity upper deviation or namely consistent. People, who compare themselves with superior group, may get relation deprivation and properly identity lower deviation. The male, people with more work or life pressure, street pedals, administrative office staff may properly identity lower deviation. The odder, people with more salary or property may properly identity upper deviation. People who think our social class differentiation is large, may properly namely consistent identify.